Retail may be one of the best and most exciting industries around, but it’s also one of the most competitive. From price wars and retail rivalries to rapidly evolving customers and tech updates, keeping up with (or staying ahead of) trends, customers, and other merchants is a huge challenge.

But that doesn’t mean the endeavor isn’t worth taking. As you’ll learn in this post, many retailers just like you are also feeling the pressures of the industry. But thanks to a bit of creativity and innovation, they were able to overcome their challenges.

Check out the retail comeback stories below and let them inspire you to take positive action towards your business.

Kohl’s was one of the retailers that was hit hard during the recession. As Fortune reported, economic downturn meant fewer people qualified for the Kohl’s store card, “depriving the store of both millions of potential new customers to mitigate natural shopper attrition.”

This, coupled with slow growth, strategic errors, and the rise of off-price chains and discounts stores resulted in little to no comparable sales growth in four years.

To address this business slump, Kohl’s has made several strategic moves, including going omnichannel, launching a loyalty program, and revamping its merchandising efforts. And fortunately for the retailer, it seem like things are starting to look up: Kohl’s had a strong 2014 holiday season and saw comparable sales grow for two quarters in a row.

So what exactly did Kohl’s do to turn things around? Here are some of the steps the retailer took:

Investing in technology

The retailer decided to keep up with the modern needs of consumers by making an effort to be more omnichannel. Kohl’s is integrating its brick-and-mortar stores with ecommerce, allowing them to serve shoppers across multiple channels and offer services such as buy online, pickup in store.

It also launched a mobile app that lets users scan and store Kohl’s cash, get product availability information, and place orders for pick-up. Customers who are part of Kohl’s loyalty program can also manage their memberships using the app.

Yes2You Loyalty Program

Kohl’s launched a loyalty program called Yes2You, to attract shoppers who don’t have a Kohl’s store card. The loyalty program allows shoppers to earn points for every dollar they spend, and enables them to share offers with friends, receive bonuses, and more.

According to Fortune, the program seemed to be paying off. Michelle Gass, Chief Customer Officer at the company told the publication that 30 million shoppers have joined the program; half of those weren’t Kohl’s card holders, which meant the department store was attracting new shoppers.

Improving its merchandising efforts

Kohl’s also made an effort to freshen up their product presentation and in-store experiences. For one thing, the retailer started to invest more in national brands, rather than just private labels. In 2014, it created “super-sized Nike areas” in its stores, and this resulted in a 20% jump in comparable sales for the brand.

Kohl’s also partnered up with fitness gadget FitBit, and prominently promoted its activity and fitness trackers in enticing store displays, which helped deliver sales that were 4 times higher than expected.

Additionally, the retailer launched beauty sections in several of its stores to better promote its cosmetic products, and this helped them generate additional sales.

Timberland becomes more data-centric to refresh the brand

A while back, Timberland was facing some tough times. According to the Washington Post, the retailer’s revenue was flat from 2006 to 2012 and it was losing market share in the Americas. Not only that, but the brand had become stale and a bit confusing.

“Here in the United States, it had become something of a hip-hop brand as rappers name-checked ‘Timbs’ in countless songs. In Asia, it was thought of as a comfort brand; in Italy, it was more fashion-oriented,” the Washington Post noted.

But in 2014, things began to shift in a positive way for the company. Sales were up in every global market and category and margins were up to 13% from about 8% in 2011.

Timberland was able to accomplish their comeback by making improvements to a number of aspects in the business, including product design, marketing, and merchandising. However, at the heart of their efforts is the move to be more customer data-centric.

The company gathered data from thousands of customers and potential shoppers to figure out what made them tick. They sought insights on their lifestyles, preferences, fashion profiles, and price sensitivity.

Timberland’s research allowed them to figure out exactly the type of customers it should be targeting. The company discovered that it should be pursuing the “outdoor lifestyler,” a person who’s in touch with the outdoors but in a more casual way (as opposed to hard core outdoorsy people). From there, they revamped their products, marketing and merchandising strategies.

Some of the changes included introducing more fashion-focused items and incorporating more of the color black in its merchandising mix. Timberland also designed more “seasonless” pieces to attract shoppers year round.

In terms of marketing and advertising, the retailer shifted their messaging as well as the positioning of their products. Instead of just talking about performance and sustainability, Timberland made ads and collateral a bit more fashion and style-centric, to entice the outdoor lifestylers it was targeting.

West Elm introduced more personality into its products and stores

When Jim Brett started as West Elm’s president in 2010, the furniture retailer wasn’t doing so well. The company wasn’t profitable, it was closing some of its stores, and its merchandise lacked personality.

But as Fast Company puts it, when 2014 came along, Brett help bring West Elm into a whole new place. The company was seeing “double-digit comparable-brand-revenue growth” and its physical stores were at the center of the company’s revival strategy.

Here are the steps West Elm took to pull that off:

Revamping the company’s product lines

To breathe life into its products, West Elm replaced its lifeless, “brown box” merchandise with more “statement” pieces that had a more global and feminine look. “Brett sourced handcrafted textiles from places like Nepal, and he remerchandised the stores and catalogs to convey a sense of creativity and discovery,” Fast Company reported.

West Elm also put more focus on American-made products, and unveiled a home goods spin off called West Elm Market, which sold at least 75% Stateside products.

Changing how the staff interacted with customers

In addition to refreshing its merchandise, West Elm also refreshed the attitudes of its staff. Sales associates were instructed to enhance their interactions with customers.

Rather than just selling to customers, employees were tasked to connect with them by talking about things that aren’t necessarily related to what they’re selling. They could recommend local establishments, introduce them to new songs, and just generally cultivate relationships with their customers.

Strengthening communities through its stores

West Elm also conducted classes that customers could attend to learn new skills. Note that these events weren’t salesy in nature. West Elm wasn’t trying to get people to buy; rather, the retailer focused on improving their local communities.

But the good thing is, despite their non-promotional nature, Brett told Fast Company that their classes still encouraged customers to “come back more frequently and spend more.”

Bottom line

We hope the stories above were able to inspire and spur you into action! If you have other comeback stories to share (perhaps one of your own), we’d love to hear them. Weigh in below and tell us your best retail success stories.

Retail may be one of the best and most exciting industries around, but it’s also one of the most competitive. From price wars and retail rivalries to rapidly evolving customers and tech updates, keeping up with (or staying ahead of) trends, customers, and other merchants is a huge challenge.

But that doesn’t mean the endeavor isn’t worth taking. As you’ll learn in this post, many retailers just like you are also feeling the pressures of the industry. But thanks to a bit of creativity and innovation, they were able to overcome their challenges.

Check out the retail comeback stories below and let them inspire you to take positive action towards your business.

Kohl’s was one of the retailers that was hit hard during the recession. As Fortune reported, economic downturn meant fewer people qualified for the Kohl’s store card, “depriving the store of both millions of potential new customers to mitigate natural shopper attrition.”

This, coupled with slow growth, strategic errors, and the rise of off-price chains and discounts stores resulted in little to no comparable sales growth in four years.

To address this business slump, Kohl’s has made several strategic moves, including going omnichannel, launching a loyalty program, and revamping its merchandising efforts. And fortunately for the retailer, it seem like things are starting to look up: Kohl’s had a strong 2014 holiday season and saw comparable sales grow for two quarters in a row.

So what exactly did Kohl’s do to turn things around? Here are some of the steps the retailer took:

Investing in technology

The retailer decided to keep up with the modern needs of consumers by making an effort to be more omnichannel. Kohl’s is integrating its brick-and-mortar stores with ecommerce, allowing them to serve shoppers across multiple channels and offer services such as buy online, pickup in store.

It also launched a mobile app that lets users scan and store Kohl’s cash, get product availability information, and place orders for pick-up. Customers who are part of Kohl’s loyalty program can also manage their memberships using the app.

Yes2You Loyalty Program

Kohl’s launched a loyalty program called Yes2You, to attract shoppers who don’t have a Kohl’s store card. The loyalty program allows shoppers to earn points for every dollar they spend, and enables them to share offers with friends, receive bonuses, and more.

According to Fortune, the program seemed to be paying off. Michelle Gass, Chief Customer Officer at the company told the publication that 30 million shoppers have joined the program; half of those weren’t Kohl’s card holders, which meant the department store was attracting new shoppers.

Improving its merchandising efforts

Kohl’s also made an effort to freshen up their product presentation and in-store experiences. For one thing, the retailer started to invest more in national brands, rather than just private labels. In 2014, it created “super-sized Nike areas” in its stores, and this resulted in a 20% jump in comparable sales for the brand.

Kohl’s also partnered up with fitness gadget FitBit, and prominently promoted its activity and fitness trackers in enticing store displays, which helped deliver sales that were 4 times higher than expected.

Additionally, the retailer launched beauty sections in several of its stores to better promote its cosmetic products, and this helped them generate additional sales.

Timberland becomes more data-centric to refresh the brand

A while back, Timberland was facing some tough times. According to the Washington Post, the retailer’s revenue was flat from 2006 to 2012 and it was losing market share in the Americas. Not only that, but the brand had become stale and a bit confusing.

“Here in the United States, it had become something of a hip-hop brand as rappers name-checked ‘Timbs’ in countless songs. In Asia, it was thought of as a comfort brand; in Italy, it was more fashion-oriented,” the Washington Post noted.

But in 2014, things began to shift in a positive way for the company. Sales were up in every global market and category and margins were up to 13% from about 8% in 2011.

Timberland was able to accomplish their comeback by making improvements to a number of aspects in the business, including product design, marketing, and merchandising. However, at the heart of their efforts is the move to be more customer data-centric.

The company gathered data from thousands of customers and potential shoppers to figure out what made them tick. They sought insights on their lifestyles, preferences, fashion profiles, and price sensitivity.

Timberland’s research allowed them to figure out exactly the type of customers it should be targeting. The company discovered that it should be pursuing the “outdoor lifestyler,” a person who’s in touch with the outdoors but in a more casual way (as opposed to hard core outdoorsy people). From there, they revamped their products, marketing and merchandising strategies.

Some of the changes included introducing more fashion-focused items and incorporating more of the color black in its merchandising mix. Timberland also designed more “seasonless” pieces to attract shoppers year round.

In terms of marketing and advertising, the retailer shifted their messaging as well as the positioning of their products. Instead of just talking about performance and sustainability, Timberland made ads and collateral a bit more fashion and style-centric, to entice the outdoor lifestylers it was targeting.

West Elm introduced more personality into its products and stores

When Jim Brett started as West Elm’s president in 2010, the furniture retailer wasn’t doing so well. The company wasn’t profitable, it was closing some of its stores, and its merchandise lacked personality.

But as Fast Company puts it, when 2014 came along, Brett help bring West Elm into a whole new place. The company was seeing “double-digit comparable-brand-revenue growth” and its physical stores were at the center of the company’s revival strategy.

Here are the steps West Elm took to pull that off:

Revamping the company’s product lines

To breathe life into its products, West Elm replaced its lifeless, “brown box” merchandise with more “statement” pieces that had a more global and feminine look. “Brett sourced handcrafted textiles from places like Nepal, and he remerchandised the stores and catalogs to convey a sense of creativity and discovery,” Fast Company reported.

West Elm also put more focus on American-made products, and unveiled a home goods spin off called West Elm Market, which sold at least 75% Stateside products.

Changing how the staff interacted with customers

In addition to refreshing its merchandise, West Elm also refreshed the attitudes of its staff. Sales associates were instructed to enhance their interactions with customers.

Rather than just selling to customers, employees were tasked to connect with them by talking about things that aren’t necessarily related to what they’re selling. They could recommend local establishments, introduce them to new songs, and just generally cultivate relationships with their customers.

Strengthening communities through its stores

West Elm also conducted classes that customers could attend to learn new skills. Note that these events weren’t salesy in nature. West Elm wasn’t trying to get people to buy; rather, the retailer focused on improving their local communities.

But the good thing is, despite their non-promotional nature, Brett told Fast Company that their classes still encouraged customers to “come back more frequently and spend more.”

Bottom line

We hope the stories above were able to inspire and spur you into action! If you have other comeback stories to share (perhaps one of your own), we’d love to hear them. Weigh in below and tell us your best retail success stories.

Teaming up with other businesses can result in a win-win outcome for you and the company you partnered up with. When done right, retail partnerships can result in additional exposure and revenue, and both parties end up happy with more customers and sales.

That said, striking up those winning partnership agreements may not always be a walk in a park. In addition to investing the time and effort to find, vet, and woo potential partners, you also need to carefully craft the terms of your agreement to ensure that costs and responsibilities are clear to both businesses.

In this post, we’ll talk about the steps you should take before, during, and after you team up with another brand to ensure that your partnership is a success. View the pointers below and put them to action the next time you’re thinking about partnering with other businesses:

Identify who to team up with and the nature of your partnership

Having an idea of whom to team up with and the nature of your partnership is a crucial first step, because it will enable you to figure out the best way to reach out to potential partners.

Your outreach approach will depend on who you’re contacting as well as and the type of agreement you’re looking to get, so it’s important to iron out these details so you can touch base with other businesses in the most effective way possible.

Shel Horowitz, a best selling marketing author and consultant who founded Green and Profitable, says that the following things are what businesses should consider when picking good partner brands:

Complementary offerings: You appeal to the same demographic/psychographic, but with products and services that work well in tandem (or in groups–like a one-stop wedding shop with florist, caterer, photographer, band, etc.)

You have similar offerings but join together to make the pie higher for all of you: Cooperative advertising with several partners in one big ad that none of you could afford on your own, a big restaurant festival with 50 participants.

Similar customer/fan base with not too much overlap: This is the success secret of many Internet marketers. They promote each other’s products and each gain new fans.

Complementary operational expertise: Take for instance, the partnership between FedEx and the United States Postal Service. FedEx is really good at logistics, and the PO is really good at last-mile delivery. So FedEx does the intercity air transport for Express Mail (and I think Priority as well) and the PO finishes the job.

Charity/for-profit partnerships with organizations whose mission is aligned with your brand identity: A construction firm can partner with Habitat for Humanity, or a restaurant could team up with a food pantry.

“I’m using this strategy myself,” adds Shell. “I partnered with Green America for the release of my 8th book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green, and we’re doing it again for my forthcoming Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World. I get in front of their 100,000 or so members multiple times, and they get a portion of the first royalty check.”

You should also think about the nature of your agreement. How will the partnership work and what’s your ideal outcome? The answer to this depends on the type of business that you and your partners have, and the goals of your venture.

But a few common examples of business team-ups that work well include:

Contests

Many companies are teaming up so they can tap into each other’s fan base and encourage sales or engagement. These types of partnerships are becoming increasingly common on social media, thanks to sites like Facebook and Instagram, which make it easy for users to tag, comment, and engage with brands.

Have a look at what The Shelter, a New Zealand-based apparel retailer did for Mother’s Day 2015. The store, along with a number of partner brands, teamed up to create an excellent prize pack consisting of items and offers from their stores. Users would simply have to comment on The Shelter’s Facebook post in order for a chance to win. This allowed the retailer to increase fan activity while putting the spotlight on its store and other retailers at the same time.

Sales and distribution agreements

Some merchants strike up sales and distribution deals with other retailers wherein one party agrees to sell the goods of the other.

For example, online retailer The Honest Company, which sells baby products, has an agreement with Target to sell their merchandise.

Events

Other retailers decide to co-host events with organizations and fellow merchants. Depending on the event, such partnerships can enable retailers to share costs, improve exposure, and connect with more consumers.

Social buzz and marketing

Sometimes a partnership can be as simple as being “social media friends.” Popular among social-savvy SMBs, these agreements can include promoting or mentioning each other on social media, contributing articles or content to each other’s sites, and running joint online competitions, among other things.

The above-mentioned partnerships are just some of the many types of agreements you could enter in with other businesses. Feel free to explore what other retailers have done in your industry to figure out the partnership that’s right for you.

Reach out the proper way

As we mentioned earlier, there are a number of ways to get into the radar of potential partners. It all depends on who you’re targeting and the type of deal you’re looking to strike up.

Here are some ideas:

Become a customer

This works best if you’re reaching out to a small business in your area. If you want to team up with a local business, become a customer yourself. Swing by their location and experience their products or services first-hand. Form relationships with their managers or owners, then bring up the idea of a partnership once you’ve built up enough rapport.

Eyeing larger partners? Be more targeted with your efforts

Landing partnerships with big-name companies (think Target or Nordstrom) may seem daunting, but it’s not impossible. Plenty of small to medium businesses have done it, and with the right strategies, so can you.

The key is figuring out the best way to get your foot in the door. For some merchants, this could be registering as a vendor to that retailer. For others, this could mean sending samples or getting in touch with their buyers.

Some merchants have landed their partnerships by finding key contacts.

Take TerraCycle, a company that turns waste into green products, which got into Wal-Mart thanks to online networking savvy-ness and persistence. According to their story on Entrepreneur.com, founder Tom Szaky scoured LinkedIn and alumni networks to find the right contact, and then “called Wal-Mart 10 times a day, every day for three weeks until he finally got through and set up a meeting.”

Similarly, Here on Biz, an app that lets users connect and keep tabs with professional contacts while traveling, landed a partnership with Virgin America and Gogo Inflight Internet by investing the time to build relationships with particular people within the company.

According to Inc.com, Nick Smoot, the company’s co-founder “used LinkedIn heavily, reaching out to key people within Virgin America to genuinely compliment them on things he believed the company was nailing.”

He also used the social media to find the right people, then engaged with them online or at conferences they attending.

Attend events

Speaking of events, there are some functions out there that are made specifically for partnerships. For example, there’s Business Matchmaking, an initiative that produces “regional face-to-face selling events, plenary seminars and workshops, online training and collateral material for primarily minority, women, veteran, and disabled veteran owned firms.”

Attendees are given the opportunity to meet face to face with representative buyers and procurement officers, so they can get contracts drawn up. Companies that attend these matchmaking events include Norton by Symantec, HP, Lockheed Martin, and more, so you’ll be in great company.

Crafting the agreement

Needless to say, the agreement that you’ll strike up with your partner will depend on what you intend to accomplish. The terms for a product distribution partnership, for instance will be entirely different from a social media promotion deal.

Do your homework

Be sure to do you homework on the rules and requirements of the other company.

For instance, if you’re getting into a product deal, you may need to provide details such as minimum orders, lead times, payment terms, wholesale and retail prices, and more. Doing a social media deal? You’ll need to know your and your partner’s numbers when it comes to traffic, readership, email marketing lists, follower counts, etc.

Have your docs and info ready

The other party will likely ask for some information from you, so be sure to have all the relevant documents ready. As Entrepreneur.com puts it, you need to “prepare for scrutiny” and have all your financial and legal ducks in a row.

Seek legal help if necessary

This isn’t always necessary, but if you’re working on a big or complicated partnership, it may be best to seek legal help. See to it that the terms are clearly outlined. Who has to deliver what and by when? What happens if one party can’t deliver? These are just some of the things that you should iron out.

Test

It’s also a good idea to test the partnership first before getting into a huge commitment. For example, if you’re contributing content, do a couple of articles first before agreeing to fill up their editorial calendar. Getting into a distribution deal? Test out the products in a few stores prior to rolling it out across all locations.

Measure your results and use that information to determine whether or not to continue the partnership.

Your turn

Have you ever entered into a partnership with another business? Tell us about your experience in the comments.

Teaming up with other businesses can result in a win-win outcome for you and the company you partnered up with. When done right, retail partnerships can result in additional exposure and revenue, and both parties end up happy with more customers and sales.

That said, striking up those winning partnership agreements may not always be a walk in a park. In addition to investing the time and effort to find, vet, and woo potential partners, you also need to carefully craft the terms of your agreement to ensure that costs and responsibilities are clear to both businesses.

In this post, we’ll talk about the steps you should take before, during, and after you team up with another brand to ensure that your partnership is a success. View the pointers below and put them to action the next time you’re thinking about partnering with other businesses:

Identify who to team up with and the nature of your partnership

Having an idea of whom to team up with and the nature of your partnership is a crucial first step, because it will enable you to figure out the best way to reach out to potential partners.

Your outreach approach will depend on who you’re contacting as well as and the type of agreement you’re looking to get, so it’s important to iron out these details so you can touch base with other businesses in the most effective way possible.

Shel Horowitz, a best selling marketing author and consultant who founded Green and Profitable, says that the following things are what businesses should consider when picking good partner brands:

Complementary offerings: You appeal to the same demographic/psychographic, but with products and services that work well in tandem (or in groups–like a one-stop wedding shop with florist, caterer, photographer, band, etc.)

You have similar offerings but join together to make the pie higher for all of you: Cooperative advertising with several partners in one big ad that none of you could afford on your own, a big restaurant festival with 50 participants.

Similar customer/fan base with not too much overlap: This is the success secret of many Internet marketers. They promote each other’s products and each gain new fans.

Complementary operational expertise: Take for instance, the partnership between FedEx and the United States Postal Service. FedEx is really good at logistics, and the PO is really good at last-mile delivery. So FedEx does the intercity air transport for Express Mail (and I think Priority as well) and the PO finishes the job.

Charity/for-profit partnerships with organizations whose mission is aligned with your brand identity: A construction firm can partner with Habitat for Humanity, or a restaurant could team up with a food pantry.

“I’m using this strategy myself,” adds Shell. “I partnered with Green America for the release of my 8th book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green, and we’re doing it again for my forthcoming Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World. I get in front of their 100,000 or so members multiple times, and they get a portion of the first royalty check.”

You should also think about the nature of your agreement. How will the partnership work and what’s your ideal outcome? The answer to this depends on the type of business that you and your partners have, and the goals of your venture.

But a few common examples of business team-ups that work well include:

Contests

Many companies are teaming up so they can tap into each other’s fan base and encourage sales or engagement. These types of partnerships are becoming increasingly common on social media, thanks to sites like Facebook and Instagram, which make it easy for users to tag, comment, and engage with brands.

Have a look at what The Shelter, a New Zealand-based apparel retailer did for Mother’s Day 2015. The store, along with a number of partner brands, teamed up to create an excellent prize pack consisting of items and offers from their stores. Users would simply have to comment on The Shelter’s Facebook post in order for a chance to win. This allowed the retailer to increase fan activity while putting the spotlight on its store and other retailers at the same time.

Sales and distribution agreements

Some merchants strike up sales and distribution deals with other retailers wherein one party agrees to sell the goods of the other.

For example, online retailer The Honest Company, which sells baby products, has an agreement with Target to sell their merchandise.

Events

Other retailers decide to co-host events with organizations and fellow merchants. Depending on the event, such partnerships can enable retailers to share costs, improve exposure, and connect with more consumers.

Social buzz and marketing

Sometimes a partnership can be as simple as being “social media friends.” Popular among social-savvy SMBs, these agreements can include promoting or mentioning each other on social media, contributing articles or content to each other’s sites, and running joint online competitions, among other things.

The above-mentioned partnerships are just some of the many types of agreements you could enter in with other businesses. Feel free to explore what other retailers have done in your industry to figure out the partnership that’s right for you.

Reach out the proper way

As we mentioned earlier, there are a number of ways to get into the radar of potential partners. It all depends on who you’re targeting and the type of deal you’re looking to strike up.

Here are some ideas:

Become a customer

This works best if you’re reaching out to a small business in your area. If you want to team up with a local business, become a customer yourself. Swing by their location and experience their products or services first-hand. Form relationships with their managers or owners, then bring up the idea of a partnership once you’ve built up enough rapport.

Eyeing larger partners? Be more targeted with your efforts

Landing partnerships with big-name companies (think Target or Nordstrom) may seem daunting, but it’s not impossible. Plenty of small to medium businesses have done it, and with the right strategies, so can you.

The key is figuring out the best way to get your foot in the door. For some merchants, this could be registering as a vendor to that retailer. For others, this could mean sending samples or getting in touch with their buyers.

Some merchants have landed their partnerships by finding key contacts.

Take TerraCycle, a company that turns waste into green products, which got into Wal-Mart thanks to online networking savvy-ness and persistence. According to their story on Entrepreneur.com, founder Tom Szaky scoured LinkedIn and alumni networks to find the right contact, and then “called Wal-Mart 10 times a day, every day for three weeks until he finally got through and set up a meeting.”

Similarly, Here on Biz, an app that lets users connect and keep tabs with professional contacts while traveling, landed a partnership with Virgin America and Gogo Inflight Internet by investing the time to build relationships with particular people within the company.

According to Inc.com, Nick Smoot, the company’s co-founder “used LinkedIn heavily, reaching out to key people within Virgin America to genuinely compliment them on things he believed the company was nailing.”

He also used the social media to find the right people, then engaged with them online or at conferences they attending.

Attend events

Speaking of events, there are some functions out there that are made specifically for partnerships. For example, there’s Business Matchmaking, an initiative that produces “regional face-to-face selling events, plenary seminars and workshops, online training and collateral material for primarily minority, women, veteran, and disabled veteran owned firms.”

Attendees are given the opportunity to meet face to face with representative buyers and procurement officers, so they can get contracts drawn up. Companies that attend these matchmaking events include Norton by Symantec, HP, Lockheed Martin, and more, so you’ll be in great company.

Crafting the agreement

Needless to say, the agreement that you’ll strike up with your partner will depend on what you intend to accomplish. The terms for a product distribution partnership, for instance will be entirely different from a social media promotion deal.

Do your homework

Be sure to do you homework on the rules and requirements of the other company.

For instance, if you’re getting into a product deal, you may need to provide details such as minimum orders, lead times, payment terms, wholesale and retail prices, and more. Doing a social media deal? You’ll need to know your and your partner’s numbers when it comes to traffic, readership, email marketing lists, follower counts, etc.

Have your docs and info ready

The other party will likely ask for some information from you, so be sure to have all the relevant documents ready. As Entrepreneur.com puts it, you need to “prepare for scrutiny” and have all your financial and legal ducks in a row.

Seek legal help if necessary

This isn’t always necessary, but if you’re working on a big or complicated partnership, it may be best to seek legal help. See to it that the terms are clearly outlined. Who has to deliver what and by when? What happens if one party can’t deliver? These are just some of the things that you should iron out.

Test

It’s also a good idea to test the partnership first before getting into a huge commitment. For example, if you’re contributing content, do a couple of articles first before agreeing to fill up their editorial calendar. Getting into a distribution deal? Test out the products in a few stores prior to rolling it out across all locations.

Measure your results and use that information to determine whether or not to continue the partnership.

Your turn

Have you ever entered into a partnership with another business? Tell us about your experience in the comments.

Nothing beats the hustle and bustle of a retail environment. With so many tasks to stay on top of (customer service, stock control, supplier management) it can sometimes be difficult to complete everything in a timely and efficient manner.

This is why having killer time management skills is critical to retail success. As someone who owns, runs, or works at a retail store, you need to ensure that you spend your time wisely and you’re able to do more of the things that contribute to the bottom line.

Below are some handy pointers to help you do just that.

Use to-do lists

It may sound simple, but you’d be surprised at just how effective to-do lists can be in time management and productivity. They’re incredibly easy to create and can do wonders when it comes to keeping you in line and making sure that no task falls through the cracks.

To help make your to-do lists more effective, here are a few tips you can use when creating them:

Write your to-do lists the day before

Always write down your tasks in advance. This will prevent you having to waste your precious morning time figuring out what needs to be done that day. Additionally, writing down your to-do list the day or night before conditions your mind for the next day, so you’ll wake up with more focus and purpose.

Order and prioritize the tasks on your list

Organize and prioritize your to-do list by making sure that your most important tasks are at the top or are numbered/marked accordingly. You want to quickly and easily see which items need your immediate attention so you can accomplish them right away.

Not sure if you can accomplish the not-so-important tasks? Then you need to either delegate them or postpone them to a later date.

What are your busiest store hours? When do shoppers flock to your location and at what time does the traffic die down? These are just some of the questions you should you ask to get familiar with your store’s peak and down times.

Figure these things out quickly using foot traffic programs such as people counters to see when shoppers are walking into your shop. Don’t have such in-store analytics tools in place? See if your POS system can give insights into sales during different times of the day.

Having a handle on your store’s peak hours will help you manage your tasks more efficiently. Let’s say your busiest hours are from 12 to 2 PM; if this is the case, then it’s better to be on the sales floor assisting shoppers, rather than holed up in your office answering emails.

Also, note that figuring out your store’s peak times doesn’t just apply to the time of day. You should also look at how busy you are at different periods of the year so you can schedule large tasks (like physical inventory counts) accordingly.

Do tasks in batches

You spend a bit of time and brainpower each time you switch gears between different tasks, so it’s best to perform similar or related jobs in the same block of time instead of spreading them out throughout the day.

For instance, if you update your social accounts on a daily basis, then it’s best to “batch” all your social media-centric tasks (e.g. scheduling tweets, updating your blog) into one time block, rather than spacing them out through the day.

You’ll complete tasks faster and conserve energy while you’re at it.

Automate and streamline operations with the right tools

A retail business has many moving parts, and it can sometimes be difficult to juggle all those components. The key to staying on top of everything? Use tools that can automate and streamline your business.

If you find yourself doing the same things over and over again, then find ways to automate those repetitive tasks. This will not only save time but as we said in our retail ebook, it would also help in reducing operating expenses.

For example, if you spend a lot of time manually coordinating staff schedules, making sense of attendance sheets and tracking employees, you can opt for an automated workforce management solution to take care of all that grunt work for you.

Deputy, a cloud-based employee management app, is an example of such a solution. It enables employees to easily pick up shifts, switch schedules, and request time off using the app itself, and retailers can monitor everything from one central location, saving them tons of time and effort.

Also, remember that apps work best when they’re tightly integrated with other applications. Go through the tasks that you regularly perform, and then see if it makes sense to introduce and integrate other applications into your process.

For example, if you spend a lot of time transferring register closures and account sales from your POS to your accounting, get the two systems to “talk” to each by either adopting retail solutions that can easily be linked (ex: Vend + Xero). You can also consider using cloud app integration services such as Stitch or Zapier.

Or if you’re dealing with long checkout times, consider integrated payments. Point of sale integrated payments allow sales to flow directly from your point of sale system to your card reader. With integrated payments, you won’t have to manually key the transaction information into the card reader. This makes it easier and faster to ring up sales and removes double entry, as well as the likelihood of human error.

Consider the case of Grain & Vine, a boutique wine retailer in Brooklyn, New York. According to owner Michael Nagdimunov, when they first opened the store, they went the “non-integrated route” with payments.

“We had a stand-alone terminal where we would process the payments, and that took longer because we had to record the same transaction in our POS. So in a sense, we were doing it twice.”

But since moving to a payment processor that integrated with their POS, Nagdimunov said they’ve been able to reduce the need for double-entry and increased the speed of checkout by over 50%

The above situations are just a few examples of how you can streamline certain processes in your business. Keep finding more of these tasks and identify solutions that can take them off your hands.

Time is money, after all, and if you can spend less time doing menial tasks, you can reduce your operating expenses, widen your margins, and free up resources better spent on growing your business.

You should also make training materials and information accessible to your staff, so they can come back to them whenever they need a refresher, instead of asking you (or worse—not asking and doing a task incorrectly.)

Keep your store organized

Keeping your store well-organized will save you a ton of time (and headaches) in the long run.

Think about it. How much time do you waste trying to locate misplaced items or directing people to the right shelf or area in your store? If you answered “a lot,” then you should take a good look at your shop and stockroom and figure out how to make things easier to find.

Label all the boxes and shelves and see to it that merchandise and supplies are in their proper place. Also look into ways that you can improve how products are positioned in your back room. For instance, it may make more sense to position fast-moving items near the door, so associates can get to them quickly.

Doing so won’t just spruce up your location and make it more pleasant, but it’ll help people locate things on their own. That means you can spend less time showing people where everything is and devote more energy doing the heavy lifting in your busienss.

Your turn

Got your own time management tips to share? Let us know in the comments.

Further reading

Do you feel overworked and always pressed for time? Check out Vend and Square’s retail productivity guide to discover the latest tools and techniques retailers are using to get more done in less time.

Download this resource and you will:

Get to know the proven process that’ll help you do away with tedious tasks

Learn how you can leverage data to save time and improve decision-making.

Get formulas and cheat sheets for measuring your store’s productivity and performance

Learn More

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